Voters support Proposition 30, and a host of other local funding measures

Ballot measures asking residents to tax themselves for the benefit of local school districts enjoyed decisive wins this week, not only in the South Bay - where all four such efforts emerged triumphant - but across Los Angeles County, where the success rate was 18 for 19.

The streak of local victories doesn't even factor in the most consequential success, Proposition 30, Gov. Jerry Brown's signature bill that spares California's public schools from taking another $6 billion hit on top of the $20 billion they've already endured in recent years.

"People understand schools have been cut down to the bare bones," said Anita Avrick, Redondo Beach school board president. "If 30 hadn't passed, just about every school district would have been taken over by the state."

The wave of success seems to hint at a reversal of fortunes for public schools and community colleges, which for several years have seen class sizes swell, the length of school years shrink and popular programs disappear.

But local education officials say it's too soon to tell what - if anything - can be quickly restored as a result of the successes, noting that Proposition 30 merely promises flat funding.

"It's like, OK, now we can somewhat relax with the knowledge that, barring some unforeseen event, it's not going to get worse," said Bill Beverly, board president of El Camino College.

Still, local education officials say they look forward to the unfamiliar business of adding rather than subtracting.

In the Centinela Valley district - which consists of Lawndale, Leuzinger and Hawthorne high schools - the success of both Proposition 30 and Measure CL, a regional parcel tax benefiting five South Bay districts, soon could mean the restoration of programs.

These could include adding assistant principals and other staff support to Leuzinger High School, or breathing life back into the district's recently decimated adult-education program, Superintendent Jose Fernandez said.

"I'm feeling really good, not for myself but for the 33,000 kids in this region," he said, referring to students not only in his district, but the other four beneficiaries of Measure CL: the Hawthorne, Lawndale, Lennox and Wiseburn elementary school districts.

In Redondo Beach, where a triumphant Measure Q will bring $63 million to cover technology expenses, Avrick said she'd like to look at restoring smaller class sizes, which in grades K-3 have risen from 20 to 28 in half a decade. But she added such a bring-back must be weighed against other possible restorations, such as the five days lost to furloughs and depleted reserve accounts.

"We're down to 3.01 percent," she said of the district's rainy day fund, which by law cannot dip below 3 percent. "That's not a position you want to be in. You want to have close to 8 percent."

The Los Angeles Unified School District would have had to cut $255 million from this year's budget, and upwards of $650 million next year if the state ballot measure had failed. To cope with the cuts, officials debated shrinking the school calendar by 15 days, canceling student transportation and consolidating or killing programs.

Those contingency plans won't be necessary with voter approval of Proposition 30, which will raise the sales tax a quarter-percent for the next four years and the tax rate on incomes over $250,000 for seven years.

Meanwhile, of the four successful measures in the South Bay, three were strictly for facilities, meaning the money can be spent only on construction or infrastructure - not teacher salaries or educational programs.

Such initiatives tend to play well here.

For instance, Redondo Beach Unified's Measure Q is the third such referendum to pass in that school district since 2000.

And El Camino College's Measure E, which will borrow $350 million to cover facility upgrades, replicates a similar success a decade ago. It will essentially allow the Torrance-area college to complete the half of campus left untouched by the first bond, not to mention guarantee 10 or so more years of steady construction.

In Inglewood Unified, Measure GG will generate $90 million for facility upgrades. It comes just several years after voters in the district passed Measure K, which borrowed $130 million for projects that include a new school, the K-8 La Tijera.